Non-Player Characters: Enemy Combatants

Conflict is central to a storyline and no conflict is more straight forward than a physical confrontation. At some point you will push the characters of your story into a violent conflict (unless you are one of the very few groups that no interest in combat in games) and you'll need to populate your world with a few bad guys to be serve as the physical manifestation of conflict. This post will cover what you need to remember when creating these enemy characters.

First thing to remember is to not worry too much about the finer details of these characters as their only purpose is to be beaten up or killed. Names are typically only given to "bosses", combative NPCs with special skills or motivations, to signal their importance. Most of your throw-away villains, minions, and other One-shot Johnny's will only be around for a scene, unless they are reoccurring, and will only require a brief descriptor for a name such as thug or mercenary.

The most important part of creating a combative NPC is listing their fight skills and ranks. You have to focus more on the mechanical side of the game for these NPCs as combat is the most rules heavy portion of the game. However, these NPCs still don't require a full sheet of stats as long as you have what they can do with a fight. Minions should be weaker than your PCs and Bosses should be a few levels above. Most minions will not have any speical abilities but your "Bosses" should have a few tricks up their sleeve to keep the battle interesting.

Health and armor are also good things to consider as they will let you know what your NPC can handle. The same rule applies to health and armor as it does to combat skill level; minions should be lower and bosses should be at the level or better than PCs. To humanize my combative NPCs I tend to make a note at what level of damage do they lose morale and flee since most people aren't willing to throw their life away if they can help it. Not only does this help to shorten the time consumption of battles it also makes sure that not everyone you create for a fight is part of a suicidal death squad.


Once the mechanics are in place all that is left to decide is what items the NPCs have on them. Looting the bodies of the fallen takes place in many games so it would be wise to figure this out beforehand. For the most part this equates to money and small items that might prove useful or interesting to the character. This can also be a good time to work in a few story elements as you never know what you might find in the pockets of a dead man.